Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Here is another project made using a few of the new In Colors being released in a few days. One of my stamping ladies requested that we make a sympathy card for this past stamp-a-stack. Those are the cards you never really want to sit down to make but need to be sent nevertheless and you don't want to put it off too long. So now my stamping ladies have a set of sympathy cards to use when the occasion arises.

The base and top layers are Naturals White cardstock which really add a lot of depth and interest. On the left corner of the base I stamped the mini background stamp Fine Flourish in River Rock to give a subtle pattern to the torn corner. I ran the top layer through the Big Shot with the Flower Garden embossing folder which is in the Summer Mini catalog. Using sponge daubers and the Calypso Coral and Lucky Limeade ink pads I lightly colored the raised image by tapping or dragging the daubers against the flowers and leaves. I made the centers of the flowers darker than the petals for more interest. For the sentiment I used the Thoughts & Prayers set which is new to me. I borrowed a friends set when I needed to make a few sympathy cards and decided that the sentiments were just right and bought my own set for the stamp-a-stack.

Tuesday, June 28, 2011

I'm sure a lot of you have been seeing the new Stampin' Up! In Colors for 2011-2012 being used on various projects and websites. I made my May Hostesses a little gift using these new colors. I can't wait until you all can order these great colors. Usually it takes me a bit to warm up to the In Colors (I'm always afraid to commit since they are only around for a short time but now that they will he here for 2 years I can let myself go and love them!). They will be available to order on July 1 when the new catalog goes live.

I made each hostess a Petal Cone filled with some little embellishments and ribbon. I used the new In Colors to embellish the outside of the Petal Cone. Look at how cute these little flowers look around the top edge!

The purple is Wisteria Wonder, the green is Lucky Limeade, next is Calypso Coral, then Pool Party and the darker blue is Island Indigo. I accented every other flower with one of the smallest adhesive pearls. How fun are these colors!! I already need to order more of the paper packs since I've used up quite a bit from my pre-order.

I used my Simple Letters alphabet die to make the first initial for each of my hostesses using Calypso Coral cardstock. Then using the A to Z mini background stamp I stamped right onto the die cut letter. I punched a hole in the letter and top of the Petal Cone flap and tied them together with some Whisper White 1/4" grosgrain ribbon.

Thursday, June 23, 2011

I do have some recent projects to share; some Father's day stuff, a birthday card and the Stamp-a-Stack projects my group did Tuesday night but they are all still on the camera and need to be edited. So I will get to all those as soon as I can but today I'm going to share a card I did a while back when I was introducing my brother-in-laws girlfriend to stamping. It is a very simple card but a great one to make multiples of or to use for new stampers.

The base of the card is Crumb Cake. We stamped the largest flower stamp from the Just Believe set in Marina Mist and then layered it on Basic Black. A Certainly Celery piece of taffeta ribbon is tied around the image panel. The thank you sentiment is stamped in black and then punched out with the oval punch and layered on a Certainly Celery scalloped oval. The sentiment is adhered with dimensionals. A great, quick card to introduce Stampin' Up! stamps, ink, paper, punches and ribbon.

Friday, June 17, 2011

So I never found the time to post the other swap cards yesterday. Cleaning and childcare just takes so much time! =) We have a busy Father's Day weekend ahead of us so I better not waste anymore time!

Andrea's Card

How great is this CAS (Clean & Simple) design?? I love how the Lattice Big Shot Die is the focal point on this card. Andrea said she uses this design to make notecard sets. Great idea!

Jenn's Card

Jenn did a great job coloring on this card didn't she? I love the pop of the yellow cat and the combination of pink and green on the rest of the card.

Jill's Card

There is so much cool texture on Jill's card. She embossed the whole bird panel so it looks and feels really neat. And the "texture" from the two different DSPs works wonderfully as well.

Kristen's Card

Don't you love this flower? Kristen said it didn't take any time at all to make the flower using the Blossom Petals punch and the Build A Blossom stamp set. I love how the scallops on the square tie in with the scallops on the edges of the flower petals.

Great job ladies! I love seeing the cards that other people make. You get so many great ideas for color combinations, layouts, and how to use different stamp sets.

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Every few months my stamping ladies do a card swap at club. I had time to participate this past month and came up with this card. I did have an ulterior motive for this design. I needed to make a wedding card for my cousin and his new wife and I only had time to design one card so I made this one into my swap card as well. Isn't this cute for a wedding, anniversary or Valentine's day card?

When the Have a Seat set came out I kind of wondered what you could do with it so I didn't get it for a while. Then I saw a few samples and decided that I should get it since I kept thinking about the cute little chairs. I didn't want to be haunted if it retired and I never bought it and then I would only see it for sale for like twice the price of what it was in the catalog. (Been there, done that right?) You can really make this set be anything you want it to be that's what's so great about it...just change the sentiment or embellishments and it can be for just about any occasion.

The base is Crumb Cake with a layer of Early Espresso topped with another layer of Crumb Cake embossed with the Square Lattice embossing folder. The bench is stamped with Early Espresso ink on Very Vanilla cardstock. I punched the hearts out of the the Glimmer Paper (LOVE THIS!) which is carrying over to the new Idea Book & Catalog and I am excited not to have to hoard it! I used the small heart punch but you could also use the smallest heart in the Heart to Heart punch. I made a bow with Early Espresso 3/8" taffeta ribbon and wrapped a Vintage Brad around the middle and stuck it through the embossed layer. On the inside I stamped "Happiness Always" from the Happy Greetings set in the Summer Mini.

Tomorrow I'll try to post the swap cards the other ladies made. It's so much fun to see all the different styles of swap cards.

Monday, June 13, 2011

I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend stamping away! I didn't get too much done in the stamp room as I was busy with other commitments but I did decide on the card designs for my upcoming Stamp-a-Stack next week. I also want to give a shout out to those who are new followers to my blog. I feel like I've had an influx of new followers the last few weeks. I hope you all find interesting projects and helpful hints here at Did You Stamp Today? Just leave a comment if you ever have any questions...I can talk about stamping all day!

Here is the last of the 3 project we did at May Stamp Club. I wanted to teach my stamping ladies the Faux Silk technique as it is pretty cool and very easy to do. I used the Faux Silk tutorial over at Splitcoaststampers. All you do is stamp your image on tissue and then crumple it up, use a glue stick all over your cardstock base, smooth the tissue paper over the cardstock and then trim off the extra tissue paper. It gives a cool wrinkled look just like silk. Easy peasy!

For this card we did the Faux Silk technique using the Strength & Hope set. We stamped in the words in Chocolate Chip then adhered the tissue paper to the Whisper White base, trimmed the extra then stamped the butterfly in Baja Breeze. You don't want to stamp the butterfly first because it might get trimmed off after you glue it down. This panel is also sponged around the edges with Chocolate Chip.

There is Pear Pizzazz seam binding going around the faux silk panel. We stamped the "Hope" sentiment in Chocolate Chip and then punched it out with the Decorative Label punch and layered it behind the seam binding. To finish off the embellishment we used the new Triple Layer Blossom Bouquet punch to make the flower and then added an adhesive rhinestone to the center. And there you have it!

Just a quick reminder that the Stampin' Up! Last Chance list is only available until June 30. Don't wait to order if there is something on your wish list that is retiring. Click on the Shop Online link on my sidebar to get started.

Friday, June 10, 2011

Here is the second project my stamping ladies did for our May get together. Coming up on Father's Day we all need some masculine cards on hand. I really love the simplicity of the single image stamp Sail Away in the Summer mini catalog and decided to combine it with the Nautical Expedition DSP. This is a pretty easy card with some great details.

The base of this card is Not Quite Navy, a color which I don't use nearly often enough. Then I layered a piece of the red striped Nautical Expedition DSP on the base. For the image panel the sailboat is stamped in Early Espresso on Very Vanilla. I then stamped the sailboat again onto Whisper White and cut out the sails and adhered them onto the Very Vanilla panel. Does it look so cool with the sails being the crisp white? I also colored in the little flag at the top of the mast with my Cherry Cobbler marker. This panel is mounted on a piece of Early Espresso cardstock.

I used the Cropadile to punch a hole in the corner of the image panel and then set one of the jumbo brads also using the Cropadile. What guys doesn't like a little bit of hardware?? I looped a length of Cherry Cobbler baker's twine (I think my most favorite item in the Summer Mini) through the jumbo brad and around a few times tying it off in the front. The sailboat is adhered with dimensionals to the base.

Thursday, June 9, 2011

Well I think summer is officially here in Richmond. I woke up this morning and the temperature was already at 73 degrees and the sun wasn't even up yet. It is supposed to be about 100 today so the dog and got our walk in and now I'm enjoying the relative cool on my front porch before the rest of the house gets moving. I hope everyone else out there is staying cool today!

I finally had a chance to take photos of the projects that we did at my May stamp club. I decided to have one project be a graduation themed since it's that time of year. And since I don't have any current graduation sets I decided to do a fun fold card. I had seen a really cool card that Dawn Olchefske showed on her blog last year and thought it would be perfect. She has a great video tutorial here showing how to do the scoring and make the tassel. I wrote out instructions for my ladies to follow and they did an awesome job...I think they were intimidated at first but once they saw how easy it was (really just a few score marks!) they jumped right in and made fantastic graduation caps.

Start with a 9 3/4" x 4 1/4" sheet of black cardstock.

1)Score the black cardstock at 5 ½”

2)Fold at the score mark

3)Put the folded edge in to the 2 1/8” mark and just make a tick mark at the top and bottom of the cardstock – DO NOT SCORE ALL THE WAY DOWN

4)Flip the cardstock over so the fold still goes in to the 2 1/8” mark and do the same tick marks at the top and bottom – DO NOT SCORE ALL THE WAY DOWN

5)Unfold.Line up tick marks along the scoring bed - right hand top tick mark with left hand bottom tick mark – SCORE

6)Line up tick marks along the scoring bed - left hand top tick mark with right hand bottom tick mark – SCORE (This makes an X across the center of your cardstock). Fold along the score marks)

7)Turn cardstock long ways and make a mark at the top at 2 1/8”

8)Using the CUTTING blade, line up the top mark with the previous score and cut off the corner.Repeat on the opposite side.This makes the square part of the hat

9)Embellish!

Hope that all makes sense when you sit down to make this card. Definitely check out Dawn's video for more of a visual.

I gave my ladies 4 or 5 different choices of colors for their stamping, numbers and tassel. I figured one would match the school colors of whichever graduate they were making it for. For my sample I used Real Red. We made the tassel by tying an 8 inch piece of 1/4" grosgrain ribbon in half. Keep the knot way up close to the fold so you don't end up with a short stumpy tassel. Then taking really sharp scissors, cut off just one edge of the ribbon. Do it again with the other ribbon piece. Now you can begin to fray the ribbon making the long silky strands. Once you have all the the ribbon frayed, cut off up close to the knot the two little comb-like piece of ribbon. Now add your tassel to the top of your hat with a brad. We used either gold or silver.

Here is what it looks like when you open the the hat. For the class year on the inside of the card we just chose our cardstock color and ran the numbers through the Big Shot with the Simple Numbers die. Of course we needed a sentiment so I went with Happy Greetings from the Summer Mini catalog.

Wednesday, June 8, 2011

Next month my sister-in-law is having a baby and a few weeks ago she had a baby shower so I made these cute (if I do say so myself!) thank you cards for her to use as she gets gifts. I know when I had my boys I was constantly sending out thank yous and it's nice to have a set of cards handy.

The design is pretty basic with some paper piecing and a little bit of bling to make it pop. I used the Slice of Life hostess set and Sweet Pea DSP for the jammies.

The base of the card is Pretty in Pink and then I ran another piece of Pretty in Pink through the Big Shot with the Perfect Polka Dots embossing folder and layered that with a piece of Whisper White. I used the largest circle on the Circles #2 die and then stamped the jammies with black Stazon ink. I stamped the jammies again on the Sweet Pea DSP and then cut them out with my paper snips. I trimmed off the cuffs and toes on the DSP jammies so they would show up white when I adhered then to the circle layer. I also colored the hanger with my Crumb Cake marker. The little heart on the jammies is accented with Dazzling Diamonds.

I used 3/8" Certainly Celery taffeta ribbon to make a fork bow and adhered it with glue dots at the top of the circle. I mounted the circle to the base with dimensionals. I hand cut the banner using a scrap of Whisper White. The thank you sentiment from Just Believe is stamped with Stazon and then accented with adhesive rhinestones.

Monday, June 6, 2011

So I've resorted to 2 blog posts today just to try to catch up so I can start showing some of the projects I've been doing recently! Here is the last of the 5 projects I made for the preschool Teacher Appreciation Week. We decided to cap off the week with a gift card for each teacher (and no, they didn't get a $50 g.c. each...the one in the photo is mine that I got for my birthday. It was all I had when I was taking the photo!). Of course if you're a stamper you can't just stick a gift card in an envelope and call it a day. You have to make it pretty and coordinated and accessorized! So to match the rest of the Teacher Appreciation Week projects I made this fun gift card holder.

How cute is this?? It was really easy to make with the Big Shot and the Top Note die. First I cut a Top Note out in Peach Parfait cardstock, then I cut another one out in Sunny Garden DSP and cut it right in half. I stamped the A to Z stamp on the Peach Parfait Top Note with Peach Parfait ink. It's hard to see in this photo but it was a nice little touch to keep the back from being boring (and a side note: I think my DH fixed our camera tonight so hopefully the pictures will be greatly improved! Who knew there were so many little screws holding a digital camera together??!!). Then I used my Tombow glue and just did a small little line all the way around the back of the half DSP Top Note, just around the edge by the small cuts. I adhered it to my big Top Note and it creates a nice little pocket once the glue dries. Just perfect for a gift card wouldn't you say?

Once my glue was dried I wrapped a length of Poppy Parade stitched poly ribbon around the middle and attached the ends together with a Pear Pizzazz Glimmer brad. I stamped the "Thanks" from the Sale-A-Bration set So Happy for You in Peach Parfait and punched it out with the scallop oval punch.

And just a quick comment about the projects I did for the Teacher Appreciation week...I only used 1 pack of Sunny Garden DSP and not even a full pack of Poppy Parade and Peach Parfait cardstock. I made 14 of each project time 5 days so 70 items total. That just goes to show how many things you can make out of 12 sheets of DSP, some cardstock and a few embellishments!

Wow!! It has been a while since I've posted anything! The last few weeks were very busy, getting ready for the end of school, having stamp club, preparing for a trip, being away on a trip (with no internet access!) and then of course returning from the trip and trying to get back to a normal routine. So there was just no time to get back on the computer and finish posting these teacher appreciation week projects. Without further ado, here is the 4th project we gave to the teachers at my sons' preschool a few weeks ago.

I made these cute little paper pinwheels using the Sunny Garden DSP and some pencils. I made coordinating tags with each teacher's name. We stuck the pinwheels into little tin buckets filled with Hershey's kisses. These pinwheel are super easy to make and would be really cute as an accent to a potted plant too.

Don't forget that the Stampin' Up! Last Chance list has been released. Go to my Stampin' Up! website HERE and click on the "Say Goodbye" link to see what will be retiring forever on June 30. Don't miss out on something you've been wanting.

About Me

I'm an at home mom to 2 boys, wife to an awesome husband who just goes with the flow when it comes to my hobby (or as he might call it- obsession!) and an Independent Stampin' Up Demonstrator since 2009.

Copyright Stuff

The content in this blog is my sole responsibility as an independent Stampin’ Up! demonstrator and the use of and content of the classes, services, or products offered here are not endorsed by Stampin’ Up! Stamp images copyright Stampin' Up and designs copyright Amanda Mertz unless otherwise noted. I am sharing on here for personal inspiration and gratification only and posts are not allowed to be copied for submission to contests, magazines etc. Thank you!